The sun was finally out. I had been waiting for it for hours; in fact, from the very minute we made our way out of our tents into the cold, crisp night of 29th August at 12 AM sharp – the turn of a new day – our summit night. I had been counting minutes for the sun to wake. If my previous expeditions were any indication, the light should have slowly started peeling off the night as early as 4 AM – making the sharp ridges of the peaks slowly appear. But it didn’t. With the cold clawing at me, as its nails dug deep through my skin right down to my bones, clutching at them; the soft flushes of otherwise harmless snow, because of the violent winds, were hitting me in my face like iron pellets. I placed one foot in front of the other, pushing my body against the throes of icy winds, all the while waiting for the warm sunshine to kiss my forehead.
